


Sleep is for the Weak

by BrightTerror



Series: BrightTerror's 2020 Whumptober [16]
Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Autistic Spencer Reid, Fluff, Gen, Headaches & Migraines, Hotch got stuck raising a bunch of thirty year olds, Hotch is basically Reid's father figure, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, Nightmares, Protective Aaron Hotchner, Reid has no brain to mouth filter when he is sleep deprived, Rossi is great too, Sleep Deprivation, Spencer Reid Needs a Hug, he is like "well this might as well happen"
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-23
Updated: 2020-10-23
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:02:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27164959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BrightTerror/pseuds/BrightTerror
Summary: Whumptober day 23: WHAT’S A WHUMPEE GOTTA DO TO GET SOME SLEEP AROUND HERE? (Sleep Deprivation)"Spencer was absolutely fine. Sure, he hadn’t slept in 47 hours, 38 minutes and 12 seconds and he was on his umpteenth cup of coffee. But he was fine."
Relationships: Aaron Hotchner & Spencer Reid, Spencer Reid & David Rossi
Series: BrightTerror's 2020 Whumptober [16]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1948378
Comments: 12
Kudos: 288
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	Sleep is for the Weak

**Author's Note:**

> Slight spoilers for s5ep9 "100" and s6ep18 "Lauren"  
> This isn't beta read, sorry for any typos or mistakes.

Spencer was absolutely  _ fine _ . Sure, he hadn’t slept in 47 hours, 38 minutes and 12 seconds and he was on his umpteenth cup of coffee. But he was  _ fine _ . He was being productive and was planning on later helping Rossi or Morgan with their work once he was finished with his own. He figured if he couldn’t sleep he might as well stay at the office and get work done, it was better than staying in his apartment with nothing to do. He had already read all the books he had and the new ones he ordered would not arrived until next week so all he would have done was get bored and _more_ anxious about not being able to sleep. 

It's not that he didn't want to sleep, it's just, insomnia was a bitch. Especially the reasons behind why he had trouble sleeping; it had begun with nightmares, ever since Emily faked her death, his nightmares had been progressively worse and every time it would be a different team member of his that got killed that he couldn’t save. He hadn’t slept well ever since. However, the problem was that now he couldn’t even sleep an hour or so with nightmares and then call it a day, now his brain was going too fast, too loud and he hadn't been able to catch more than 30 minutes of sleep in the last two days. 

He desperately needed to do something since his sleep problem was starting to affect his job. He knew sleep deprivation or fatigue could turn up as moodiness and irritability as well as headaches and slowed reflexes and responses, but knowing the symptoms did not mean he could avoid or control them any better. He was frustrated he almost messed up the case because of it. 

They had finished the last case just a few hours ago so his most recent mess up was still fresh in his mind --not that he could ever forget it with his eidetic memory--it happened when they went to apprehend their latest unsub; Reid had snapped at two cops on the way to the warehouse where the guy was and it just got worse from there. If it wasn’t for Morgan he would have been shot because he didn’t duck fast enough. His reflexes weren’t the greatest on a normal day but today they were even worse. 

He had shrugged it off when his team asked about it. JJ left him alone but every now and then threw him somw worried glances as well as Emily and Morgan. Although Morgan tried to get him to talk when they were on their way to the jet, he left him alone after that. They knew better and had a good sense when Reid needed to be left to chill out. 

Rossi knew better too, but he didn’t care about what would be the best course of action, he still pestered the kid all the way on the plane. “ _ Patatino, I know you think it's a good idea to continue working when you are clearly not sleeping- no don’t even try to deny it, Reid, I can see those eye bags of yours have eye bags on them, besides, I’m a profiler. How long is it since you slept? you have to sleep, have you eaten yet?” _

Reid had  _ not  _ liked that, his patience was almost non-existent and he was dwelling on his latest mess up on top of his lack of sleep, which is why after a few minutes of being pestered around he completely _snapped_ at Rossi. He felt horrible for it afterwards, especially when Rossi just gave him a worried look and patted him in the arm before going to take a seat next to Hotch instead of getting riled up. 

Reid needed to get a grip of himself. He dived himself in a book for the rest of the flight to avoid any more incidents. Once they arrived at Quantico everyone but him and Hotch left home. It was pretty late, so the rest decided to finish the paperwork for the case the next day. Rossi wanted to rest and have some scotch and pasta to relax, Emily had to feed Sergio, JJ had to go put Henry to sleep and Morgan needed to feed Clooney, Garcia accompanied him because she had wanted to have a movie night. 

Hotch stayed late as usual, Jessica was in charge of Jack today and he always had a lot of work to do. He hoped he could get enough work done in the weekdays so he had a chance to spend more time with his son in the weekends, if he wasn't called to a case, of course. Grabbing a cup of coffee he strided into his office and locked it to avoid interruptions. 

Reid... well Reid didn’t have to stay. But he  _ did  _ so he made himself yet another cup of coffee with lots and lots of sugar in it and went straight to his desk, ignoring the dark spots in his vision when he stood up, or moved too fast. He sighed, _he really needed to sleep._

Usually he could finish the paperwork in record time, but tonight was different, he had spent the last 30 minutes in the same report, and he hadn’t made any significant process to finish it. 

After 45 more minutes and yet another cup of coffee, he finished his own paperwork, but instead of calling it a day and leaving to try and get his much needed sleep, he decided to sneak into Rossi's office to get his part of the work done. It was the least thing to do after snapping at him like that earlier, he wanted to apologise. So, he got the necessary papers from his office and returned to his cubicle. 

By then his muscles were aching more than before, the energy needed to lift the pen was too much and his three long-day headache was turning into a full-fledged migraine. 

He shut his eyes and pressed his fingers into his temples to try to ease the pain, once his eyes were opened again, it was too bright and  _ when did it all become so blurry _ ? He shook his head to try and clear his vision, but it was no use, he was so  _ tired _ , and he couldn’t even sleep.

His jaw did a cracking sound as he yawned for the fourth time in the last five minutes. That definitely was not a good sign… he knew yawning was a mechanism to keep your body on alert, normally he would recall some statistics about it, but he was too tired for it... he yawned again. 

He gulped his entire cup of coffee in one sitting and lightly slapped his cheeks a few times to wake himself up. His body was begging him to sleep at this point but unfortunately for him his body and brain were not on the same page, every time he tried to sleep and get lost to the world his brain would simply not shut up and the sleepless nights trying to quiet it would begin. 

He squinted hard as he worked on Rossi’s paperwork and shook his head ever so slightly every time his eyes began to get blurry. He lived with migraines half the time lately, so he was able to deal with it better than the rest of his exhaustion. 

A few more minutes of working in suffering, his stomach started to get upset, he didn’t know if it was due to the sleep deprivation or the insane amount of coffee he had consumed lately. He guessed it was probably both. 

24 minutes later he was  _ almost  _ done with Rossi’s work, but he couldn’t take it anymore, the migraine had gotten worse and even if he wanted to sleep and go home there was no way he could. He was in no condition to drive and he didn’t even have the mindset anymore to call for a cab at this point. 

He groaned quietly and hid his whole head into his arms as he slumped over onto his desk. He didn’t know how long he was like that when he felt a tap on his shoulder. He jumped and looked around for the origin of the touch and found Hotch staring at him with his usual Hotch Frown™️. It took him longer than he wanted to admit to realise that Hotch was talking to him.

“Hotch.” He blinked quickly to clear the blurriness and sat up straight. “What can I help you with?”

Hotch pursed his lips and sighed. “Reid when it’s the last time you slept?” he repeated

“I rest when I blink, sleep is for the weak.” He mumbled before realising what he said. He really didn’t have any filter at this point huh. “Hotch I’m sorry-“

“Reid, you need to take better care of yourself.” He sighed tiredly, it reminded him how he talked with Jack when he was in his moody days. He noticed Reid’s strained eyes and frowned. “Are you having one of your migraines?”

Reid winced and nodded hopelessly. 

He moved his hand, motioning for him him to stand up. “Come on.” 

“Huh?”

“Come to my office. Now.” Hotch said and grabbed his arm to support him. “Let me help you; you look like you will pass out any moment now.” he spoke gently. 

Reid didn’t have the energy to respond so he yawned and followed him into his office. 

Once they arrived Hotch manhandled Reid on the couch and then left the office without a word. He came back a minute later with a blanket. “Dave likes to keep a blanket in his office along with his scotch. Don't tell him you know though.” he smiled. 

“What?” Reid was not following. Usually he is the one who gets everything first with his 187 IQ, but his limits were reached, and he was _tired_. He scratched his eyes with the back of his hands. 

Hotch sighed. “Take your shoes off and lay down.” Reid tried to protest; He was fine and didn’t need to sleep there but Hotch stopped him from whining. “You’re going to take a nap, or I will force you to take days off.” he gently pushed Reid so he was laying across the couch instead of sitting. 

Reid begrudgingly did as told and laid down on the couch with the blanket sprawled on top of him. 

“Reid, I can see you’re not sleeping lately; you can’t keep going on like this.” 

“Sleep won't do me any good.. When I sleep nightmares happen..” he mumbled as he got more and more comfortable on the couch. 

Hotch did not know what to answer, Reid reminded him of Jack in that moment, tired and scared of nightmares.. He was too familiar with those, especially with Jack after what happened to Haley… he didn't know what to say so he used the tactics he did when handling his son. “If you nap you can show the rest of your team your physics magic before the briefing.”

Reid yawned and gave one of his little smiles as his eyelids began to drop. “Really?” 

“Yeah, really.” Hotch tucked him in the blanket and went back to his desk to finish his work. 

He let himself smile at the sight of Spencer sleeping peacefully at his couch. He never really signed up for this when he became unit chief and didn’t know exactly  _ when  _ he became a dad to a bunch of thirty to forty year olds but he didn’t mind it, he handled Jack all the time, he could handle his 30 year old kid just as well.

**Author's Note:**

> I just really love Hotch and Rossi as Reid's father figures you know? 
> 
> If you want to come and chat find me on Tumblr as: [BrightTerror](https://brightterror.tumblr.com/)  
> Have an amazing day!


End file.
